Cass County sex offender charged with enticing a child through texts

A 62-year-old Cass County man was arrested Thursday and accused of enticing a child through texts and being a felon in possession of a gun.

Robert R. Nolen was taken into custody after detectives with the Cass County Sheriff’s Office searched his home in the 200 block of West Second Street in Freeman.

According to a probable cause statement, the parents of a 14-year-old boy reported to the sheriff’s office that Nolen had sexual contact with the boy.

Nolen is listed as a sex offender on the state’s registry. He was convicted of sexual assault involving a 7-year-old girl in 1986 in Colorado, according to court records and information on the state’s registry.

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The boy reported several incidents as recently as last October. The sexual contact allegedly happened at Nolen’s home, court records said.

Authorities also reviewed sexually explicit text messages sent between Nolen and the boy.

The boy reported seeing several guns in Nolen’s home, and said he feared for his safety if he told anyone about the alleged sexual incidents.

The boy’s statements prompted the sheriff’s office to request a warrant to search Nolen’s home this week.

Detectives inspected several airsoft rifles and handguns found at the home. They also located a a Norinco SKS long gun.

In an interview with a detective, Nolen admitted to having a gun in the home.

Nolen also said children in the area occasionally came over to his house to play with his 9-year-old son.

Nolen denied touching children inappropriately, and told the detective he “frowned on that, highly.”

He also told the detective he had pornographic material in his home but that he never showed it to the children. He also said the victim in this case once gave him some “porn” to keep his family from seeing it.

The defendant acknowledged the text messages but said he had “no intentions,” court records said. He also said the text messaging started with the boy saying, “Hey, what’s up?”

When a detective read back to him an explicit message he later sent the boy, Nolen replied, “I may have said that. I don’t remember.”

Nolen remained in the county jail Friday with bail set at $100,000, cash only, the sheriff’s office said in a news release.

An arraignment in the case is scheduled April 5 in Cass County Circuit Court.